Product Description

User Reviews

Overall Rating:

Value Rating:

Submitted by
Bruce Ainge
a Audio Enthusiast

Date Reviewed: August 29, 2014

Bottom Line:

The Technics SA-DA10 is getting on, I grant that, but it is an impressive bit of kit, and peeking inside the case does nothing to dispel your respect for it. It was the first time I'd seen an amplifier with a tuner which had bi-wiring connectivity, which I wanted to go with my Tannoy Profile 632 speakers. Prior to getting it, I had used a Sherwood RV-7050R Receiver, but I felt backing vocals in particular were missing. I swapped the Sherwood for a Harmon Kardon 6300, which improved aspects of missing information, but still, I wasn't happy. It all changed after getting the Technics and switching over to the bi-wiring channel. There it was. Now, the sound was tighter and no longer loose and flabby. Stereo image suddenly popped into a believable soundstage. It was controlled with all vocals now coming at you from real people. My audiophilic appreciation was now fulfilled. Apart from one thing: Why didn't the fan at the back move? Even a little. This was the first time I had ever seen a fan on a hifi amp and I was baffled by it, until after a pleasurable indulgence in revisiting my CD collection, lasting about 4 hours, I felt the outer casing and considered cooking my next meal on it. It was at least as hot as some valve amps I'd seen. Then, I thought I knew why this amp needed a cooling mechanism. So, why didn't it go round? Even if it had a heat sensor circuit which was controlled to maintain a uniform temperature, that still didn't answer the question of the fan serving no purpose, because if the fan was part of a cooling system, it failed to function. So I worried. I changed the fan, just in case. No different. Now, surely if it ran hot and a fan was a feature of the design, it must be for a good reason. If the fan failed to function, I was going to be in trouble sooner or later. Sometimes I could play music all day. My imagination ran wild and I could see my new (second user) amp, bursting into flames as molten metal ran down my sound system housing. If you saw the movie '2012', then you'll know what I mean when I say I fancied I saw a little Woody Harrelson gazing in awe at the spectacle. I went on line and saw almost instantly that getting hot wasn't unique to my Technics, it was a common experience with other users. Here is what I did. I went to my local electronics supplies shop (Maplins) and bought some kit and took it home. Took out the fan and pulled the cable attaching it to the board inside the box. I then put 6 1.2v AA sized batteries into the plastic holder, giving me a 12volt pack. I attached a connector to the terminals on the pack, having a black and a red cable on, which I then rigged up to the fan. It sprang into life. I pulled out one battery, braking the circuit and screwed the fan back onto the back of the amp. I then put the battery I taken out back in, completing the circuit again and the fan went round at a rate of knots. I then put the lid of the amp back onto the chassis and put the mains cable back on it and switched the amp on. I ran a CD for about 40 minutes and tested the temperature of the case. Stone cold. The battery pack I rigged isn't noticeable at the back of the amp, so it is a neat solution. I don't know how many hours the fan will need to run before the batteries give out. Well, I'm still experimenting. But I have an amazing sound reproduction which I can make go very loud and it is impervious to a heat build up. Sorry Woody, you live to act another day.

First, I describe myself as an audiophile because I love this stuff, and I spend whatever free time i can, listening closely to movie and music alike. So my opinions come from years of experience.
Always on a budget, I am regularly searching for the diamond in the rough. For me, harman kardan have always been that, the audiophile grade receiver at the more budget price. Unfortunately, hk's newest receivers have one unnacceptable feature-they shut off, continuosly, randomly, whatever. Too bad, because it is a gorgeous piece. On to the technics review.
have had the sada10 for two weeks, and i'm very impressed. The build quality is very solid, anti vibration chassis very cool. Champagne face plate looks more like brushed stainless, very handsome, looks cool with the blue lighting, which is dimmable. My first listen was through definitive technology bp8's, and right away, I heard subtleties that were absent using my hk avr25(still a great receiver.) At low volume, with my ear close to the speaker, there is virtually no audable noise, and that's without turning on the variable gain control. The receiver does run hot, i reccommend as i've done, to use a fan to keep things cool. I use a small vornado fan on very low, and that's all it takes-you can't even hear it. (for small spaces, brookstone makes a small black fan for 35.00 that's tiltable to fit on tight spaced shelves, aimed up still directs aie through top of receiver). To get this much receiver for 200 bucks is like a wish come true, very happy. P.S.-I reccommend 10 guage speaker wire to get the most signal, and to keep it cooler. Go to fluance.com, a loww cost, but i think, a great sounding budget priced speaker (i have their 70 dollar center, very solid and great sound). Anyway, they sell spools of 250 feet high grade 10 guage wire for 40.00, a steal. you'd spend 5-600.00 for name brand, and believe me, it's the same stuff-oxygen free.

This is an update to my previous review. I have completely upgraded my speaker system to take advantage of the unique audiophile features of this A/V receiver; in particular, I now drive Polk RT800i towers using the bi-amplification capability of the SA-DA10. Combined with VGCA, the result is simply astonishing. Puts my neighbor's B&W's out to pasture. Stunning soundfield, articulation, nuance - never before have I heard a system which allows audible access to the recording engineer's decisions. Pinpoint positioning of instruments, simply lifelike in ways I've never before been exposed to. I look forward to the day I can afford a DVD-Audio player - it's now the next step!

With my newly upgraded speaker setup (see below) this system achieves remarkable musical reproduction and home theater. I'm almost embarrassed to say I picked up this incredible, high quality, hi-fi A/V receiver for $199. I can't think of any competitor which offers true bi-amp capability for under $700. And even if one did, it still couldn't achieve the 120db headroom of VGCA. I simply thank my lucky stars for having found this incredible gem. After over a year of use, I honestly believe there is nothing close to this guy; not even the Outlaw.

OK
My wife and myself finaly went for prologic.Made our livingroom into a theater room.Then we went shopping for electronics.First let me say that our "music system"is a Quad 606 amp,Quad 306 pre,Roksan Caspian CD and B&W 801 series II speakers.
Whith that said one should see we have at least some ear.
She set my budget at 2500.00 and I already had four Kef C-75 floor standing speakers (the first UniQ series)I thought would do nicely.We looked and and listened all day and on the way home just for kicks we stopped at Rex Audio Video (not the kind of place we go for audio)I saw the Technics SA-DA10 took it home (again just for kicks) and have never looked back.
From its good binding posts to the sturdy build I was impressed.
We added a B&W center speaker and THIS thing ROCKS !!!!!
As for the overload problem well I have never seen it and we run this at One oclock for hours on end.As for music listening well if you have realy fine taste then this is not for you.But this reciever is not for music realy is it ????
In closing if you are looking for a good sounding reciever give it a try.
PS Using Kef speakers might have somthing to do with sound quality.

Okay, one reason why I bought this receiver was because the look. The champagne-gold finish was a real eye catcher, and the aluminium front panel contributes to its vintage styling. In the good old days almost all receivers were built like a tank, nowadays black plastic dominated the chart, I wonder what happened? Anyway, the face of the Technics receiver was very clean, with a large volume control in the middle companied by a smaller knob for input selection(both were aluminium, not plastic), three small knobs for bass, treble and balance, a couple of small buttons for power, tuner, digital input, 5.1 input, VGCA, and speaker selection, and that was about it; the clean face plate looked so good I could sit and stare at it all day. There was also a front panel input for say, a camcorder, so you won't have to fiddle around with inputs in the back. All five speakers used 3-way binding posts, and all inputs were gold plated, a nice touch! A quiet fan was also in the back for cooling, and it only turns on when needed, no fan noise here! The anti-vibration base was pretty effective on eliminating rattles, but air-borne resonances might still vibrate the case. Open the "hood" of the receiver reveals about 30,000 mfd of capacitance, enough to support harsh dynamics of today's blockbuster movies. Every components were of high-quality, especially the TA-KE II capacitors, which looked like stacked donuts.

Listening:

Trying to describe every little detail is almost a waste of time; to put it in a simple way, this receiver rocks! It has power reserves to overload all five of my JBL N24s and N-Center, running full range, at the same time! To this day I still haven't been able to stress this receiver to the point of distortion, nor will I want to; I can only listen to very loud music for a short period of time now, because it hurts my ear. Note that the JBLs have a sensitivity rating of 86dB(a well known magazine confirmed that), which is very low. If you run a pair of uh, those gigantic pro audio speakers, you will most likely go deaf. Sound quality is also top notch for its price range, I can very well hear the lowest noise in a movie, while big explosions rocked with authority. The unusually strong subwoofer preamp output can drive any powered subwoofer to its limit without a problem, and the fan keeps every heated components under control. One thing about the fan, however, is that if you have the crossover on for all five speaker which means the receiver is taking a easy load, it will only come on at a pretty loud level; otherwise the heat vent is burning hot, do not ever stack anything on this receiver, or a meltdown of both equipment can result. Because heat is one main reason something fails, I put a small brushless DC fan on top of the vent to keep it cool at all time.

Meanwhile...

I just helped a friend to set up his receiver for home theater, after one hour of messing around I realized that how ease-of-use my own receiver was; my friend's Pioneer D498 was hard to setup, and the controls were not easy to learn. Finally I had the rig running and I realized that bass was distorted and missing, after fiddling around I found two bass controls: one for bass limit and one for 5.1 bass level. I found these controls totally useless, it distorted the bass and the manual didn't explain what it was actually for(note there were still the usual sub on/off and volume on top of these controls). The Technics SA-DA10 had no such nonsense, it was an easy and simple 10 minutes before sonic nirvana. The universal remote that came with the Technics was easy to use also, by the way.

Conclusion:

Since I can't go one day without listening to music, the Technics SA-DA10 receiver has become a part of my life. All my friends are very impressed by what this receiver can do, and so am I. Highly recommended.